Posted on 10/21/2014 6:10:29 AM PDT by dennisw
Supreme Court Overturns Illegal Immigrant’s ID Theft Conviction
MAY 04, 2009
The Supreme Court has unanimously ruled that an illegal immigrant who used stolen documents to work is not guilty of identity theft because he didn’t know the information belonged to another person.
The ruling eliminates an important tool for prosecuting and deporting illegal aliens who victimize Americans by stealing their identities to get jobs in this country. In its 18-page decision the court says that the crime of identity theft is limited to those who actually know they stole someone else’s information.
Prosecutors must therefore prove that illegal immigrants who use false identification papers know they belong to another person to be convicted of identity theft. The Supreme Court ruling, which resolves conflicting appeals court decisions on the issue, overturns the aggravated identity theft conviction of a Mexican illegal immigrant (Ignacio Flores-Figueroa).
Flores-Figueroa had pleaded guilty to two counts of misuse of immigration documents and one count of illegally entering the United States. He was subsequently convicted on two counts of aggravated identity theft which added two years to the 51-month sentence for the previous crimes.
In 2000 the illegal alien used a fake name and Social Security number to get a job at an Illinois steal plant. In 2006, he told his employers that he wanted to use his real name and submitted new documents, including a Social Security number he bought in Chicago that belonged to someone else.
But in the High Court’s opinion, Justice Stephen Breyer writes that the law requires prosecutors to show that the defendant knew the counterfeit identification belonged to another person. The court agreed that the illegal immigrant could be charged with a misdemeanor for using an identification he knew was false, but he could not be charged with a felony of aggravated identity theft because he did not know he was using someone else’s Social Security number.
Please tell me you are kidding.
This was a 9-0 decision so the conservative justices joined in.......
Can someone somehow explain the legal reasoning behind this. How this critter is not guilty of stealing someones SS number? Thanks!
I just cannot see it!
Did Scalia write the majority opinion?
this has been applying since 2009...a 2009 decision that even Justices Thomas ans Scalia joined in on
Freudian slip or plain dumb?
Stolen Identity factory?
The Supreme Court has unanimously ruled that an illegal immigrant who used stolen documents to work is not guilty of identity theft because he didn’t know the information belonged to another person.
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“he didn’t know the information belonged to another person”
Okaaaaay
The argument was that the illegal didn’t know the information belonged to another person. Forget the fact that they conspired to acquire unlawful documentation, you mean to tell me that they were so dumb they didn’t think it was illegitimate?
Last I checked, ignorance of the law is not a valid legal precept.
America’s waning days are growing ever so much more troubling.
More details from the NY Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/05/us/05immig.html?_r=0
The question in the case was whether workers who use fake identification numbers to commit some other crimes must know they belong to a real person to be subject to a two-year sentence extension for “aggravated identity theft.”
The answer, the Supreme Court said, is yes.
Prosecutors had used the threat of that punishment to persuade illegal workers to plead guilty to lesser charges of document fraud.
“The court’s ruling preserves basic ideals of fairness for some of our society’s most vulnerable workers,” said Chuck Roth, litigation director at the National Immigrant Justice Center in Chicago. “An immigrant who uses a false Social Security number to get a job doesn’t intend to harm anyone, and it makes no sense to spend our tax dollars to imprison them for two years.”
Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. said in a concurring opinion that a central flaw in the interpretation of the law urged by the government was that it made criminal liability turn on chance. Consider, Justice Alito said, a defendant who chooses a Social Security number at random.
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An old decision with current ramifications.
And one wonders why the reputation of the law, lawyers, and supreme court jesters...er...judges has sunk to such a low that even sewage has to descend to attain the same level.
We have now gone down the rabbit hole, no turning back.
So now ‘Ignorance’ IS a viable defense.??
The only way I could see it is if the defendant was given it, likely by some crony Obama lover DHS worker. They probably don’t speak very much English and were told that the papers were his, and he was a citizen now!
With all the rumors in South American countries spread to flood America with illegal immigrants I honestly would not be surprised if Obama himself initiated this hypothetical transaction.
The fix is in.
In its 18-page decision the court says that the crime of identity theft is limited to those who actually know they stole someone else’s information.
Good decision.
What conservative justices?
And by tht logic, he could rob a bank because he because he didn’t “really” know who the money belonged to...right?
Up is down
Down is Up
Lies are Truth...
http://www.wnd.com/2009/02/89839/
Flores-Figueroa claims he is not at fault because he “had no intention of stealing anyone’s identity” when he purchased numbers from a person in Chicago who sells sham IDs.
So, with Kevin Russell of Howe & Russell representing him, the illegal alien took his case to the Supreme Court.
On Wednesday, in Flores-Figueroa v. United States, the court will hear arguments on whether an illegal alien who fraudulently uses identification can be charged under the statute without proof that he knew the ID was stolen.
An estimated 8 million U.S. citizens become victims of identity theft every year. The case could protect illegal aliens from prosecution if the Supreme Court rules they cannot be charged under the federal statute unless prosecutors can prove they knew their fraudulent IDs belonged to American citizens.
Acting Solicitor General Edwin Kneedler wrote in the brief that the federal statute is meant to “provide enhanced protection” for victims of identity theft.
“The harm the victim suffers when her identity is so misused bears no necessary relationship to the perpetrator’s awareness of her existence,” he wrote.
Los Angeles attorney Stephen Masterson supported Kneedler’s position, stating that the question of whether an illegal alien knows he
Read more at http://www.wnd.com/2009/02/89839/#BAEydkEU8hX6qHZ3.99
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